Embassy of the Dead: Hangman's Crossing by Will Mabbitt, illustrations by Taryn Knight

Embassy of the Dead:  Hangman's Crossing by Will Mabbitt, illustrations by Taryn Knight
Series:  Book Two of The Embassy of the Dead 
Format:  E-ARC
Publisher:  Walker Books US
Number of Pages:  240
Publishing:  October 26th, 2021 
Source:  Edelweiss+

Opening Line:  "Ghosts don't feel the cold."

Jake Green is still alive, just barely, after having averted death on more than one occasion while preventing Fenris from bringing forth the Age of Evil.  In the past month, Jake received a postcard summoning him to the Embassy of the Dead.  A summons that he's been avoiding, but when the Embassy summons's you, they will find a way to get you to respond.  Once at the Embassy, Jake and Cora, his hockey swinging, best friend, who happens to be a ghost learn that they're to become Undoer's, someone who helps ghosts resolve their unfinished business on the Earthly Plane so they can make their transition to the Afterworld.  Their first Undoing assignment, Errol Clay, a particularly difficult specter who believes he was betrayed by his brother during a botched robbery attempt.  While following a lead at an old warehouse, Cora and Jake stumble upon a plot involving the smuggling of stolen artifacts, the disappearance of Amber Chase, a ghostly Embassy investigator and plans for a plague demon to cross over into the Earthly Plane, putting everyone's life in danger.  Hoping to prevent the demon's release from the Afterworld, Cora and Jake travel across the Void, bypass the City of the Dead and have a run in at Hangman's Crossing with a particularly dangerous demon, all to hopefully save the living.  Can they figure out who the culprit is behind the evil plot and stop them in time?  Or will Jake perish trying?

Mabbitt provides a nice little recap for the first book in the series, but I would encourage to check out The Embassy of the Dead prior to reading Hangman's Crossing.  I quite enjoyed the creepiness and humor of this book more than in the first.  The worldbuilding around the Afterworld, the City of the Dead and especially Hangman's Crossing was well done.  There's something eerie and unsettling about taking that boat across the Void and I just loved the balance of spooky and mystery in this book, trying to figure out who was behind it all.  Jake continues to be my favorite character, he truly wants to be helpful, as long as it doesn't put him in danger.  Well at least not at first, cause he does face a lot of danger in this book, but he also can't ignore when others are in danger.  Also really liked Cora's enthusiasm for adventure, wanting to jump right in and sort of save the world.  The story moved along at a really nice, fast moving pace, with plenty of suspenseful moments, the kind you'd expect from a story involving ghosts, demons, shadowfolk and an Embassy for the Dead.  So yeah, a few body possessions and the added bonus of one creepy tree and plague demon.  A special thanks to Taryn Knight for the illustrations of familiar characters like Stiffkey, and Bad Penny and new people like the boatman from the Void.  While the ending was satisfying, I'm happy Mabbitt left room to add in further adventures for Cora and Jake and the possibility of a new member joining their team.                    

A Few Cybils Suggestions for Nominations

 There's three days until public nominations for the Cybils close and so many wonderful books out there that have yet to be nominated.  I really hope you'll consider nominating your favorites in children and YA!!   We're looking for books published in the U.S. or Canada between October 16, 2020, to October 15th, 2021 (one book nomination per Category per person).  Nominations will only stay open until October 15th, so don't delay.  Publishers and authors will begin their nominations on October 16th.        

 There are lots of different categories to choose from and you can get more information here about each category.  Plus a list of what books have been nominated thus far.   

   

This year I'm a round one judge for elementary/mg speculative fiction category!  Here's the category description

    

"It never fails to amaze me how every year brings such a wild and wonderful assortment of middle grade speculative fiction books! Along with spells and space rockets, this is the category for books with talking animals, time-travel, ghosts, and paranormal abilities, and all the other books that might not have obvious magic on every page, and which are set here on Earth, but which push past the boundaries of daily life into what is almost certainly impossible, or at least hasn’t happened in real life yet (though it might happen next year…).

The two main criteria of the Cybils are excellent writing and kid appeal, and these come first and foremost when we assemble our shortlist. These books will be ones whose creativity, world building, and characters fly off the rapidly turning pages and into our hearts and minds."

— Charlotte Taylor, Category chair

With that in mind, might I make a few suggestions of books that haven't been nominated yet.  Some I've read and others I would like to read, or better yet, nominate your favorite!  For more suggestions and ideas for yet unnominated books check out Charlotte Library's List of Spooky Books not yet nominated  and A Library Mama's list of books she would like to see

 

Archibald Finch and the Lost Witches by Michel Guyon

 Archibald Finch and the Lost Witches by Michel Guyon
Format:  E-ARC
Publisher:  Andrews McMeel Publishing
Number of Pages:  352
Publishing:  October 19th, 2021 (1st published 10/8/18)
Source:  Edelweiss +

Opening Line:  "Three young girls are wandering through dark woodland."  

Eleven-year-old Archibald is admired by his teachers for his intelligence and called the teacher's pet by his classmates, other common names are dweeb, brownnoser or wimp for avoiding confrontations.  His older sister, Hailee seemingly tolerates Archibald.  A few days after being notified of their grandmother's funeral, their parents pack the family up and move them from London to their grandmother's manor in the countryside of Cuffley.  Archibald is unnerved by the creepy manor, the squeaky floors, drafty hallways and enormous amount of spiders and cobwebs.  Bartholomeo, the manors caretaker doesn't help ease Archibald's nerves.  Then one day while exploring for his Christmas present, Archibald happens upon what he believes to be his "special present" from his parents, a globe.  However,  this is no ordinary globe, there are ancient words, etches of strange combination of animals, where two animals are merged together as one and islands are on the globe in places that don't appear on any map that Archibald has ever seen.  Later that same night,  Archibald begins to twist and turn various components of the globe and he and part of his bedroom are absorbed into the globe to a secret world.  Meanwhile, Hailee is left reeling after witnessing her brother's mysterious disappearance in a flash of light and embarks on her own quest to try and find out what happened to him.

I've always been a huge fan of books set in old houses or manors, they contain so much history and nooks and crannies to explore.  The story of Archibald Finch and the Lost Witches is a portal fantasy with part of the story taking place in an ancient world filled with creatures called Marodore's comprised of part beast, part human and young witches that have been trapped for over 500 years.  The other portion of the story takes place with Hailee in Cuffley as she tries to piece together the clues of Archibald's disappearance.  It reminded me a lot of The Spindlers by Lauren Oliver and The Clockwork Crow by Catherine Fischer, in that both of the those stories involve a young girl going in search of their sibling and ending up in a new mysterious world.  Or maybe it's how Hailee feels to blame for her brothers disappearance, either way, each of these stories take you on an adventure into the unknown.  What I enjoyed the most about reading this book were the illustrations,  full page black and white ones depicting the Marodore's, the library of the manor and my favorite one of the bottles on the shelf in the antique shop.  So gorgeously detailed and add this mysterious atmospheric quality to the story that I absolutely loved.           

Knights and Bikes by Gabrielle Kent, illustrations by Rex Crowle and Luke Newell

Knights and Bikes by Gabrielle Kent, illustrations by Rex Crowle and Luke Newell 
Series:  Book One of Knights and Bikes 
Format:  Paperback
Publisher:  Sourcebooks for Young Readers
Number of Pages:  256
Published:  August 2nd, 2018 
Source:  Publisher in exchange for an honest review

Opening Line:  "The wind howled around the cabin like a rabid beast as the rain crashed against the windows." 

On a dark rainy night, Demelza is startled by an intruder breaking into the camper she shares with her pet goose, Captain Honkers.  After subduing the girl, Demelza is surprised to find that this girl is close to her own age.  Not having many friends, or the heart to send Nessa back out into the rain, she offers her a deal, in exchange for letting her stay, Nessa has to become her bestest friend ever.  And so the two girls seal the deal with a spit handshake.  

Nessa has many secrets, and a past she's not willing to share just yet.  She however is intrigued by Demelza's home, the camper park and the crazy golf course Demelza and her dad run.  When Demelza learns her home is about to be sold, Neesa agrees to embark on a treasure hunt across Penfurzy Island with her.  With the help of Captain Honkers, Demelza's mother's journal, and a set of clues pointing them to a lost castle, rumored to be protected by the Penfurzy Knights the girls hope to locate the legendary treasure and save Demelza's home. 

Knights and Bikes is based off of a crowdfunded videogame of the same name.  In the game, as with the book two girls are on a small British Island, sometime in the 1980's exploring for a lost treasure.  According the games website, some of the inspiration came from Cornwall, a peninsula in the southwestern portion of England, King Arthur's Castle and the movie Goonies.  The designers had hoped to capture that adventurous spirit of being a child in the fictional setting of Penfurzy Island.  The story is so imaginative and I certainly felt that free spirit of childhood reflected in the girls riding their bikes going on an adventure.  Reading the book was kinda like being at an amusement park, with all the excitement, anticipation, and defiantly a wild ride.  I also loved the 80's vibe of comic books, videogames and of the Goonies inspired gear the girls brought with them as they explored the island, sure there was flashlights, spare batteries, and bubblegum, but a toilet plunger, pop rocks and chip sandwiches were just the icing on the cake.  Oh and those anime like illustrations by Rex Crowle and Luke Newell tie in beautifully with the videogame and just added to the excitement of the story.  At it's heart, Knights and Bikes resonates with the theme of friendship and I really look forward to clipping in for the next wild ride in Rebel Bicycle Club.    Here's a sample of the artwork style and energy of the game.  Enjoy!!  

     

Crashing in Love by Jennifer Richard Jacobson

Crashing in Love by Jennifer Richard Jacobson  
Format:  ARC Paperback
Publisher:  Candlewick Press
Number of Pages:  255
Publishing:  October 12th, 2021 
Source:  Raquel Stecher from Candlewick Press in exchange for an honest review

Opening Line:  "I skitter around the bedroom I share with my sister Calla, tucking my nightshirt beneath my pillow, picking up the stuffed animals that fell off my bed in the night."

Twelve-year-old Peyton was all set for the perfect summer in Mussel cove, Maine.  She was hoping she and her best friend, Mari would finally find their first boyfriend and get a job together working at the Anchorage Hotel.  Then last minute, Mari decided to help her Aunt with her new baby instead.  Disappointed, Peyton tries to make the best of things.  While out riding her bike one morning, Peyton stumbles across a boy lying in the road unconscious, the victim of a hit and run accident.  After calling for an ambulance, she waits with the boy along the side of the road and vows to make it her mission to find the person responsible.    

What initially drew me to Crashing in Love was the cover and title.  I don't see many books with a main character riding a bike and I was intrigued by the story premise.  It reminded me a lot of a younger version of the movie While You Were Sleeping.  Like Lucy in the movie, Peyton knows nothing about the unconscious person of her affection, yet instantly has a crush on this handsome boy.  He even seems to fit her ideal boyfriend type, having all of the qualities on her wish list for a boyfriend.   While visiting Gray at the hospital, Peyton meets Gray's mom and gets caught up with how she treats her as a young adult and how warm she is to her for caring about her son.  Peyton spends time at the hospital talking to Gray while he's in a coma and eventually is hired by his mom to sit with him a few hours a week.  While at the hospital Peyton sees a boy named Jax and starts to suspect he might've been involved, she even tries to get her mother to investigate, as she's a local journalist, but is disappointed when her mom tries to stop her from visiting Gray all together.  As with While You Were Sleeping, when Gray wakes up from his coma, Peyton's view of him begins to change.  Which seems natural because he was only an idea to her.  Overall, Crashing in Love was an entertaining book and captured that teenage, angsty, obsessive desire to find a boyfriend, while also cautioning that sometimes it's better to really see what's around you instead.  

Polo Cowboy by G. Neri, Illustrations by Jesse Joshua Watson

Polo Cowboy by G. Neri, Illustrations by Jesse Joshua Watson  
Format:  ARC-Paperback
Publisher:  Candlewick Press
Number of Pages:  288
Publishing:  October 12th, 2021 
Source:  Raquel Stecher from Candlewick Press in exchange for an honest review

Opening Line:  "Mama is fuming."

Cole had planned to return to Detroit with his mother at the end of the summer, but Philly has turned out feeling more like a home, everything that is important to him is here.  How could he leave his beloved horse, Boo behind?  Although it goes against the deal they struck, Cole's mom eventually agrees to let him stay with his dad, Harp.  Now Harp has his own plans for Cole, which begin with him pulling his own weight around the Ritz, the makeshift barn they constructed.  Cole is expected to attend school and is surprised when Harp unexpectedly takes him to his new job as a stable hand for the George Washington Military Academy's polo team, a school of mainly white, rich, arrogant males.  Cole is disappointed that he won't be able to spend time with his cousin, Smush, but Harp says it's better for him to stay clear of Smush because he will only get him into trouble or hurt.  Shortly after starting his job, Cole runs into Ruthie, the girl he met practicing polo in the police corral near his home, and is surprised to learn that Ruthie is the teams first girl and person of color polo player at the academy.  Ruthie see's the way Cole is able to manage the horses, that he has potential for polo and she likes the way he doesn't shy away from her facial vitiligo, a skin condition that causes areas of her skin to loose their color, leaving patchy areas on her face.  Ruthie begins to teach Cole the ins and outs of polo, which eventually sparks an interest in playing the sport and possibly attending the academy himself.  However, Cole has many obstacles to overcome, including Ruthie's teammates who are determined to keep him from joining the team.    

Polo Cowboy is the sequel to Ghetto Cowboy, which was adapted into the film Concrete Cowboy in 2020 and centered around Cole coming to Philly to live with his dad after some trouble at school, and was also inspired by the urban cowboys of Fletcher Street in North Philadelphia.    Although I haven't read the first book, it's not necessary, but I'd highly encourage you to check out Ghetto Cowboy, I know I will be.  According to the authors acknowledgements,  Neri was inspired to write Polo Cowboy because of a young boy's story idea to write about Fairmount Park's African American polo team.   

Polo Cowboy was such a wonderful story, everything from the setting, characters, and plot was just perfection.  I know nothing about polo and found myself getting caught up in all the details about how to ride the horse, what the hazards are and how to connect with the ball while holding a long mallet and riding a horse.  I do think my favorite parts were Cole's cowboy version of polo that he played with the neighborhood kids.  I instantly enjoyed Ruthie and her self assuredness, wanting Cole to look her in the eyes and not just her face, to be "seen" by him.  I so enjoyed watching their relationship develop.  I also really liked how Harp's relationship with Cole changed from forcing him to fend for himself at home and the academy, to a caring, involved, loving, proud father.  Such touching moments.   I love how Neri uses the words and phrasing of the urban city and how the dialogue between the characters felt natural, authentic conversations between two friends.   Most of all, I enjoyed the black and white illustrations by Jesse Joshua Watson, although my review copy didn't have the final illustrations, what I saw so beautifully matched the story.  

**A huge thank you to Raquel Stecher from Candlewick Press for my review copy.**

The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy by Anne Ursu

The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy by Anne Ursu
Format:  E-ARC 
Publisher:  Walden Pond Books
Number of Pages:  432 
Publishing:  October 12th, 2021
Source:  Review copy provided by Sabrina Kenoun from SparkPress via Netgalley

Opening lines:  "There were few women pictured in the great tapestries of Illyria - besides the witches, of course."

Marya Lupu is from the small village of Banat within the greater kingdom of Illyria.  Within this realm, male sorcerers are coveted for their ability to wield magic and protect the kingdom from the Dread.  Every boy has the potential to be a sorcerer, but only a few pass the magical skills test.  Marya's parents have always assumed that their son, Luka was going to be a great sorcerer.  He is admired by everyone in their village, and her parents have placed all of their hopes on his success, while Marya is seen as not being able to do anything right.  On the day of Luka's test, Marya does the inexcusable, she ruins her beautiful new dress and causes their goat to interrupt Luka's proceeding.  While trying to rectify things, she also does the unfathomable,  insults the sorcerer performing the test.  Marya's parents are devastated, and not long after Luka receives a letter informing him that he will not be invited to become a sorcerer.  Then a few days later a letter appears, this time the family is told that Marya has been invited to attend Dragomir Academy, a school dedicated to reforming troubled girls.  Marya is placed at Rose Hall with four other girls and per the arms long list of rules she received on the way to the Academy, the girls are not supposed to talk about their past lives, instead they are to focus on "comporting themselves as ladies" and perhaps one day they can be placed on the estate of a sorcerer.  As the days go by, Marya becomes suspicious about the founder of Dragomir Academy's daughter.  Why has all traces of her disappeared from the tapestries of the family hanging on the walls and why did her parents create the school for troubled girls?  What is it that makes them so troubled?  When a startling new illness begins to take hold of the other students causing them to spend time in the infirmary, Marya is encouraged to further explore the secrets of Dragomir Academy.

I've had the pleasure of reading a few of Ursu's other books, Breadcrumbs, The Lost Girl, and The Real Boy and have always enjoyed her writing and characters.  She's written a few empowering girl stories and her latest book, The Troubled Girls of Dragomir Academy is such a book.  Ursu focuses on the power imbalances or inequities that exist between various genders and explores this in the way that the boys of Illyria, like Luka are meant to grow up and become sorcerers, revered for their strength in battling the Dread, while some of the girls, like Marya are troubled and need to be reeducated into proper ladies.

At the beginning of the story, Marya doesn't appear too upset about her lot in life, males and females each have their own roles to play.  Marya and Luka have a grudge that dominates the first quarter of the story where they're focused on getting even with each other by pulling pranks meant to one up the other.  Marya puts honey in Luka's shorts and he ruins her dress.  Marya grumbles about how her parents see her as being unladylike, unable to do anything right, or how she essentially has to stay out of her dad's way, while her mom dotes on Luka, and is way stricter on her.  Throughout the story, the girls thoughts are manipulated in a way that causes them to doubt their own worth, at first believing that they're troubled and can never do anything right.  It's really sad how their parents disown or allow them to be taken to this Academy.  Marya is treated so unfairly and you can't help wanting to give her a hug, or send her another letter from her next door neighbor,  Madame Bandu, who was such a delight by the way.  I loved how she was the one who taught Marya how to read and write, offers to apprentice her as a master weaver, and keeps telling her that she did nothing wrong.  She's such a support to Marya and her kindness just radiates in the story.  Now Luka was interesting.  At first he was sort of stuck up, nose in the air kinda guy.  When he didn't get asked to be a sorcerer he doesn't seem too surprised, almost relieved.  Partially because his parents have put so much pressure on him to be the great sorcerer and bring pride to their family, and partially because of the amount of time/energy he put into preparing for his new role.  Once Marya is sent away, he changes for the better and I couldn't help wondering why?  Like why didn't he spill the beans about Marya knowing how to read?  I liked how Marya described him as having many sides, "the gifted, dutiful, cruel and one of fear," and maybe he's meant to represent that people are more complex than you think.  Lastly, I enjoyed how the story is meant to question "who does the story serve?"  and "who benefits?"  For the girls of Rose Hall, is was through their being educated at the school and daring to question what they were being told from the men around them.  I'd pair this with Miss Ellicott's School for Magically Minded by Sage Blackwood.  

** A huge thank you to Sabrian Kenoun from SparkPress for the E-ARC via Netgalley  **